


sister, sister

by orphan_account



Series: old gods in forgotten kingdoms [5]
Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Dreams, Dreamscapes, Family, Family Reunions, Freedom, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Memories, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-23
Updated: 2019-11-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:41:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21536881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: hornet deserves more than an empty death, decides the ghost.
Relationships: Herrah the Beast & Hornet (Hollow Knight), The Hollow Knight | Pure Vessel & Hornet & The Knight
Series: old gods in forgotten kingdoms [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1505879
Comments: 9
Kudos: 98





	sister, sister

She drives her needle deep into the crack of the Hollow Knight’s shell.

The opening is a small one. It is a tiny crack above its right eye (does it have eyes?) and a strange liquid drips from the crack. Hornet adjusts her hold on her weapon minutely, peering closely at the Hollow Knight. The Infection glows in its eyes.

It shrieks, nail swaying unevenly towards the Ghost. They’re shaking, trembling, that same substance dripping from their arms and shell. They  _ will  _ die here, Hornet knows, somehow. She knows what she has to do.

Her needle flies forward, thread wrapping around the Hollow Knight. It is forced to its knees. Easily catching the weapon, she runs forward, into the Temple and into her demise - she is going to die here, too. They will all die.

Nevertheless, she pushes the needle further into the Hollow Knight’s skull. It - no, they, they are not that unfeeling being as she had thought - lets out a sad, mournful wail as she keeps it down. Ghost must act, now. They must fulfil their duty and save Hallownest.

A strange weapon glows in their hand. It looks almost like a nail, although smaller. Somehow, it seems ethereal. There is something… off about it. Hornet does not trust it.

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees the Hollow Knight move. Their arm - their  _ one  _ arm - raises up as if to drive their nail through her sibling’s skull. Hornet catches the flat of the blade, as heavy as it is. It aches in a way that she cannot place.

Ghost is facing her when their weapon slices through the Hollow Knight’s shell. She thinks she sees something like grief in their eyes.

(The moment is a blur. One second, she is watching the Infection glimmer in her sibling’s eyes and their nail is pressing against her. One second, she is seeing grief and hurt and pain in her sibling’s blank face.

In the space between seconds it all changes. Shifts, somehow. The Hollow Knight is nowhere to be found. The world is painted in a golden, radiant glow. Her sibling climbs and ascends and climbs and something falls apart beneath their nail. She doesn’t see what.)

She  _ feels  _ more than she sees in this space between seconds. Bathed in golden light, Hornet feels as if she understands something that she could never know before. There is something about this space that feels entrancing.

She could stay here forever.

Something presses on the edge of her mind. A… a voice, maybe? She can’t quite tell.  _ STAY FOREVER,  _ says the voice.  _ EVERYTHING HERE IS GOOD AND WONDERFUL AND BRIGHT.  _ The pressing on her mind grows more insistent. It should be perfect here.

Hornet feels the pressing intensify, to the point that it burns. Everything burns - it’s  _ wrong, wrong, WRONG EVERYTHING IS FINE  _ but she ignores the shrieking voice of the deity. She has a duty to perform.

Her sibling’s nail lashes against the deity’s body. They shriek and burst apart, the last remnants of their soul lingering in the air. Void rushes into the place where they once were; Hornet can only stare as something larger than life fills their empty shell.

Their other sibling howls, and their arm wraps around the deity. Leashes of void curl around it; it gives a desperate, dying howl and the world is stained black. Her siblings tear the dream apart with an ease that should terrify her.

When the deity is nothing more than wisps of essence, Hornet sits. She relaxes. There is no more threat to Hallownest - there is no more Infection, no grand enemy for her to face against.

“I am glad, I suppose, that it is gone.” Hornet says to the empty air. “I had never thought that the Infection would be gone for good.” The large being that used to be their sibling is silent.  She sighs. “And yet… I wonder if we could do better. If we could prevent more casualties, if we could save others - if we could prevent Mother from dying, in the end. It all comes back to her for me.”

The large being remains silent. A long arm (too long, it doesn’t seem real) drapes over the floor of the dream. Their deep voice rasps,  _ could… fix. make… better. happy. would… accept? _

"What do you mean, little Ghost?”

They make a strange clicking sound. White essence pools around their left arm, the arm that their other sibling had been missing.  _ essence… left. old… light… old… dream. could FIX FIX FIX… if… dreaming… if… dreamt. hornet… has dream? _

_ hornet… dreams. ghost… dreams… our sibling… dreaming. could fix. light… essence. burns. use. fix. repair. accept? _

Their explanation is one of the most complicated, confusing things that Hornet has heard. She supposes that only makes sense. They have not had a voice of their own, after all. Yet something about it is compelling.

Perhaps it is an impossibility. Perhaps Hornet is only letting her hopes grow higher, for them to eventually fall down. Perhaps she is simply desperate for Mother to live once more and for their small, haphazard family to be reunited once more. Her hopes linger.

Hornet nods.

She -  _ remembers,  _ as strange as it might be.

Her first moments had been spent in the Abyss. Days? Weeks? Time seemed to travel unendingly in any direction. She knew a few things - her name,  _ Hornet,  _ the closest sibling is twenty-two paces away, she will leave this place in the span of forty-three moments. She knows exactly what she needs to and yet it is not enough.

It is not enough.

Hornet twists and it is forty-three moments later. She is looking through a stranger’s eyes as the gates to the Abyss open once more. This is the final time that they will open, and the final time that they will close. This is the time that she will leave, and the time that her siblings will be trapped.

She climbs,  _ upupup  _ and  _ higherhigherhigher  _ until the seal on the door is clear. She tucks herself into a ledge. She will wait. The door will open. She will be delivered to Herrah, named the Heir of Deepnest, and her mother will die.

It has to happen.  _ Hornet  _ does not know how, but the knowledge is stuck in her mind. She knows that  _ Hornet  _ will ascend to the world above and wander beaten paths and meet her siblings once more and  _ Hornet  _ will break apart beneath light, pale light, warm light -

Father opens the door, and takes Hornet. He leaves her siblings to die.

It is… familiar, and yet not. Herrah holds her carefully, like she is a newborn to be swaddled and cradled. She supposes that she is. She is new and young and old and reborn all at once. It is a strange feeling.

She does not complain.

“Mother,” says Hornet, old-memories soft in the back of her mind. The thought of  _ it  _ plagues her. “I miss my siblings.”

“...Your siblings?” Asks Herrah. She sounds soft, disbelieving. Does she not trust her? Does she not know of the Pale King’s other experiments? “The King said there was only yourself and the Hollow Knight within the Abyss.”

Hornet frowns. She traces the shape of her sibling’s horns in the dirt, leaving the points clear to see. “There wasn’t-!” She starts. “I know there were others. Ghost and Lost and Crystal and the Third and Whisper-” Hornet traces more shapes in the dirt. Her siblings. She misses her siblings.

How strange. She never met most of them.

She doesn’t miss the look of concern on her mother’s face.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter @starrywins i've rebranded since i last posted!
> 
> i always see ghost time traveling and i decided 'fuck it. hornet in da past' pls support me


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